The present invention relates to a storage system, a data transfer method, and a storage medium, and is preferably applied to, for example, a storage system that transfers data between disk array apparatuses.
Conventionally, a widely known storage system includes disk array apparatuses that have physical storage areas such as hard disks to store volumes that are logical storage area units, wherein the disk array apparatuses have a duplicating function to transfer data between them and copy data.
When such a storage system receives an instruction to back up a backup target (a file or similar) and if the attributes of the backup target and a method for managing duplicated data obtained by the backing-up of the backup target are designated, Japanese Patent Laid-Open (Kokai) Publication No. 2005-108133, for example, suggests a method for managing the designated attributes and the like by associating the designated attributes with the duplicated data and volume names to store the duplicated data.
As a means of disaster recovery for the storage system, data from a first disk array apparatus operated at a certain site (or terminal) is transferred to and backed up at a second disk array apparatus set up at a remote site (hereinafter referred to as “remote copy”).
However, if the remote copy is executed by this storage system, data is transferred from the first disk array apparatus to the second disk array apparatus in the order of the data written in volumes of the first disk array apparatus. Accordingly, there is a problem in that backup of important data may be left until later.
Moreover, in order to transfer all the data from the first disk array apparatus and back it up at the second disk array apparatus, the amount of data transferred increases. As a result, there is the problem of increasing copy time.